by Otto Penzler
He bumped into some one on the stairs. He saw the face of Sue McEwen. She was peering at him, startled.
“Out of the way!” he gasped. “Up the stairs!”
Thicker fog blanketed him as he forced the girl higher. On the balcony, with Sue recoiling against the far wall, he paused and tossed more bombs. Now the room was full of muttered cursing, coughing, shouts of pain. Dargan, finding his case empty, grimly grabbed a gun from his pocket and retreated to Sue’s side.
“I’ll keep ’em away from you!”
The Moon Man, at the first crash, had begun working his way behind the grille toward the electrically-operated door. As he edged through it, he saw several black-masked men writhing on the floor, disabled. Tears were streaming from the eyes of the others. The Moon Man was edging toward the main entrance, gun leveled against possible attack, when he was startled by a sudden burst of gunfire in the street.
He wheeled, peered out. Police cars were swarming over the pavement outside. Uniformed men were leaping from them, guns out, rushing toward the doors. Flame and lead clashed again as the Moon Man backed away.
The clerk’s quick telephone call had brought results!
The black-masked men outside were retreating before the blasting fire of the squad car cops.
A bedlam of alarmed shouts rang inside the bank as the Moon Man whirled away. He groped through the choking fog, glimpsing red- and black-masked faces. And as he moved he heard a shout from outside:
“Fill that door!”
The voice of Gil McEwen!
Twisting back, the Moon Man saw McEwen leaping for the bank entrance. The black-masked gang had recoiled and the way was open. Those inside were crowding down upon McEwen as he pushed through. The detective drew up short, face-to-face with a red-masked man with leveled gun.
One instant, through the swirling fumes, they glared at each other—McEwen and Quintus.
—
The automatic in the hand of Quintus snapped out fire as McEwen bellowed and leaped. He dropped to one knee, his gun flashing in the dimmed light. Twice he fired, with deadly speed, with grim accuracy. And two bullets drilled into the chest of Quintus.
The red-masked man crumpled, clawing the air. He sprawled on the floor, gun dropping from his hands. McEwen leaped up again with a bellow of savage satisfaction.
Death to Quintus, murderer of the teller, sender of the brass warning to Ned Dargan.
The Moon Man was on the stairs now. As McEwen leaped farther into the bank, eyes streaming scalding tears, he retreated a few steps. McEwen paused, peering up.
He saw the glistening silver globe that was the Moon Man’s head. He saw the black-robed figure in the fog. A triumphant cry rang from his lips as he leaped forward.
McEwen’s gun crashed.
The Moon Man felt the bullet tug at his robe as he sagged back. He gasped in anguish. Swiftly he fired in return—sent a bullet which he prayed would miss McEwen. Then, leaping black lightning, he bounded to the balcony above, and raced along it.
He saw a door closing, glimpsed Dargan’s strained face an instant. He sprang to it. He pushed through, and whirled.
He backed to the door of the directors’ room, and behind his silver mask his streaming eyes widened upon Sue McEwen.
Dargan had forced her into the room, away from the gas and the bullets. She had retreated against the table. She stood immobile, peering at the black-robed figure with the globular head of silver. Her lips parted with a silent sob; and from the Moon Man’s shell of a mask came a groan.
Footfalls sounded on the balcony outside. Twisting, he shot the latch of the door. Fists crashed against the panels. McEwen’s voice came:
“Open up!”
Dargan gasped: “Gosh, Boss—it’s him! He’s got you cornered!”
The Moon Man tore his hidden eyes from the face of Sue McEwen. He crossed the room swiftly, to the windows on the opposite side. Swiftly he threw one up, and peered down. An alleyway lay below. It was deserted now; but in a few seconds, the Moon Man knew, the squad car men would be swarming into it.
Then the Moon Man saw a telephone pole within reach, a pole that reached as high as the building.
“Climb up, Angel!” he gasped, whirling back. “You can make it! You’ll be safe up there until you can get away without being seen!”
“Boss! I’m not leaving you now! Not when McEwen’s got you cor—”
“Up, Angel! Quick!”
The Moon Man forced Dargan across the room to the window. With savage insistence he obliged Dargan to climb through. Poised on the sill, Dargan peered back.
“Boss! Oh, God, Boss!”
“You did your work well, Angel! The Red Five’ll think it was the clerk’s telephone call that broke up the plan. Quick, Angel—up!”
“Don’t worry about me, Boss! I’ll get away, all right! Good luck, Boss—so-long!”
Dargan reached out, and gripped the pole. Swiftly he climbed, wrapping arms and legs around it. As he rose higher, fists pounded again on the door behind the Moon Man, and McEwen’s voice shouted:
“Break down that door! He’s in there! We’ve got him cornered this time!”
Now Dargan was near the top of the pole. He reached out a leg, steadied himself against the edge of the roof, then pushed over. He disappeared from view quickly.
—
The Moon Man turned. One quick glance he gave the pale, strained face of Sue McEwen. She was still staring at him, transfixed.
“Sue!”
She gave no answer.
With a moan, the Moon Man reached out the window for the pole. His fingers had not yet touched it when there was a rush of feet across the pavement below. He glimpsed men running into the alleyway—uniformed men—members of the squad car crew.
Swiftly he ducked back.
From below came a hoarse shout: “Cover those windows!”
The Moon Man retreated. Shouts continued to come from below. The door was still shaking with the hammering of McEwen’s fists. Now a shoulder crashed against the panels, and the wood cracked.
Sue McEwen took a quick step toward the Moon Man. She sobbed: “Steve, Steve!” He stood erect—a black-garbed figure with shining silver head—looking down at her.
“Sue!”
Quickly he lifted the mask of Argus glass from his head. His eyes were streaming with tears from the sting of the gas. He had been obliged to place his automatic on the table to remove the mask; and as he lowered it he saw, startled, Sue’s small hand snatch up the gun.
She leveled it.
“Take off the robe!”
“Sue—for God’s sake—”
“Take it off!”
Not understanding, he obeyed. When the robe and gloves were flung onto the table beside the mask, Sue stepped forward again. Her face was grim and drawn as she turned the gun in her hand. Swiftly she swung it—struck out with it—and the hard metal cracked to the side of Steve Thatcher’s head.
He recoiled, stunned. The bruise beside his temple was livid red, but he did not even feel the pain of it. He was peering dazed into Sue’s desperate eyes.
The girl quickly snatched up the robe and gloves and mask. She jerked open the drawer of a filing cabinet which sat in the corner. Quickly she stuffed the regalia into it, dropped the gun in. She slammed it shut; and then, without a glance at Steve Thatcher, she hurried across to the door.
She drew the latch.
Gil McEwen thrust in. He stopped short, gun leveled. His eyes snapped from the white face of his daughter to the haggard features of Steve Thatcher.
“Where is he—the Moon Man?” he demanded. “I saw him come in here!”
“He—he hit Steve with a gun—and climbed out through the window. He went down into the alleyway, Dad!”
McEwen leaped for the window. His voice roared down at the men below:
“Look for the Moon Man! He got down there! Scatter and grab him!”
Whirling back, halfway across the room, Gil McEwen stopped short.
> “By damn, if he’s got away again! By damn, we’ve saved the bank from being robbed anyway! We’ve got one man, with a red mask, dead, and a full dozen of the others! We’re cracking into this gang! But the Moon Man—by damn—”
“He got out minutes ago, Dad!” Sue said swiftly. “I couldn’t open the door because Steve was—hurt so badly—”
McEwen strode to the door and stopped again. His eyes glittered back.
“What the hell are you two doing here, anyway?”
“We—we came here—seeing about the house we’re going to live in when we’re married, Dad. This bank holds a mortgage on it, and—we came to talk terms. We were going to surprise you—”
McEwen tore himself away. He went running down the stairs shouting orders to “get the Moon Man!” Sue McEwen turned slowly, and her eyes sought Steve Thatcher’s. He was gazing at her in amazed confusion.
“Steve!”
Sue McEwen went into his arms. He crushed her body close to his. Her cheeks pressed his warmly and her lips, close to his ear, whispered.
“I’ll never tell them, Darling—I’ll never tell!”
“God bless you!” murmured Steve Thatcher. “God bless you, Sue!”
“I can’t let it matter, Steve—not now. I understand. We can’t let it matter.”
From below Gil McEwen’s voice rang gruffly: “Get the Moon Man—get the Moon Man!” And in the room on the balcony the Moon Man clasped close to him the girl he loved.
Rogue: Vivian Legrand
The Adventure of the Voodoo Moon
EUGENE THOMAS
ALTHOUGH THE GREAT PULP MAGAZINES of the 1920s and 1930s were noted for their fiction, Detective Fiction Weekly, one of the most successful of the mystery pulps, liked to run two or three true-crime stories in each issue. Easily one of the most popular series featured a female spy named Vivian Legrand, who was not identified as a heroine.
Beautiful, intelligent, and resourceful, she was also a liar, blackmailer, thief, and the murderer of her own father. Her exploits, which were reported by Eugene Thomas (1894–?), began to appear so regularly that doubt was cast upon their veracity—with good reason. Without apology, DFW continued to run stories about the woman dubbed “The Lady from Hell,” now acknowledging that the tales were fictional. Were any of the stories true? Was there really a woman named Vivian Legrand? There is little evidence either way, but only the most gullible would accept the notion that all the stories published as true had any genesis in reality.
Thomas, the author of five novels, created another series character, Chu-Seng, typical of many other fictional “Yellow Peril” villains. A Chinese deaf-mute with paranormal abilities, he works with the Japanese in their espionage activities against the United States in Death Rides the Dragon (1932), The Dancing Dead (1933), and Yellow Magic (1934). He is thwarted by Bob Nicholson, an American agent, Lai Chung, a Mongol prince, and a team of lamas who counteract Chu-Seng’s powers with their white magic.
“The Adventure of the Voodoo Moon” was originally published in the February 1, 1936, issue of Detective Fiction Weekly.
THE ADVENTURE OF THE VOODOO MOON
Eugene Thomas
Chapter I
Crooks on Holiday
THE LADY FROM HELL was standing on the upper deck of the little inter-island steamer as it neared the coast of Haiti. Her crown of flaming red hair was beaten back from her smooth forehead and her white dress modeled tightly to her body by the strong trade wind.
She and her companion in crime, Adrian Wylie, had just completed one of the most amazing coups in their whole career, and were now on a vacation. The Lady from Hell had been emphatic on that point before leaving Havana.
“Nothing is to tempt us into mingling business with pleasure,” she had told Wylie. “Not even if we stumble across the vaults of a bank wide open and unguarded.”
Now, the second day out from Havana, the sun was just rising over the blue bubbles dreaming on the horizon that were the mountains of Haiti, and still she could not account for the vague sense of disquiet, the little feeling of apprehension that had been growing in her ever since the steamer passed between Morro Castle and its smaller counterpart on the other side of Havana harbor.
No one on the little steamer dreamed that she was the notorious Lady from Hell, whose fame had already filtered even to the West Indies. And if they had, it would have seemed incredible that this graceful, beautiful woman could have started her career by poisoning her own father; could have escaped from a Turkish prison—the only time in her career that the net of the law had closed about her—could have held up and robbed the Orient Express, a deed that had filled the press of the world, although her part in it had never even been suspected.
The daring coup in Havana that had added a large sum to the bank account of Adrian Wylie, her chief of staff, and herself had not been brought to the attention of the Cuban police. And, although the police of half a dozen European countries knew her well and swore when her name was mentioned, there was not a single thing with which she could be charged, so cleverly had her tracks been covered, so adroitly her coups planned.
She turned away and began to stride up and down the deck. More than one passenger turned to stare at her as she passed with a rippling grace of motion, a little lithe stride that told of perfect muscles and the agility of a cat.
A sound made her turn as a passenger came up behind her and fell into step with her.
“Good evening, Mrs. Legrand,” he said in English, with the faintest of accents. “You are up early.”
“I was eager to catch a sight of Haiti,” Vivian responded with a smile. “The mountains there are lovely.”
“They are lovely,” he responded, “even though Haiti is my home I never tire of seeing her mountains grow about the horizon line.” Then he added, “We dock in a few hours. See that headland there,” and he pointed to an amethyst bulk that thrust itself out into the sea. “That is Cap St. Feral. The port is just beyond it.”
—
There was an impression of power, perfectly controlled, about Carlos Benedetti that was perfectly evident to Vivian Legrand as she surveyed him for a fleeting instant through narrowed eyes. His face was unhealthily pale, the nose slightly crooked, the black eyes very sharp and alert, beneath the close-cropped and sleek black hair. He had the air of one to whom the world had been kind, and from it he had learned assurance and a kind of affability.
But behind his assurance—this affability—the Lady from Hell sensed something that was foreign to the face he presented to the world, something that made her cautious.
“Do we dock?” she queried. “I thought that we landed in small boats.”
“The word was incorrectly used,” he admitted. “I should have said that we arrive. Cap St. Feral is not modern enough to possess a dock for a ship of this size, small as the vessel is.” He hesitated a moment. “I assume that you are not familiar with Cap St. Feral.”
“No,” Vivian said. “This is my first visit to Haiti.”
The man’s oblique stare was annoying her. Not that she was unaccustomed to the bold stare that men give beautiful women. But this was different. Had the man been wiser he might have taken warning at the hard light that lay in the depths of her geenish eyes.
But he went on suavely:
“To those of us who know the island it offers little in the way of entertainment,” he said, “but to a stranger it might be interesting. If you care to have me, I should be glad to offer my services as a guide while you are in port.”
A casual enough courtesy offered to a stranger by a native of a place. Vivian thanked him and watched, with a calculating eye, as he bowed and walked on down the deck. The man was sleek, well groomed and obviously wealthy. His spotless Panama was of the type that cannot, ordinarily, even be bought in Equador, where they are woven. A hat so fine and silky that usually they are reserved as gifts to persons in high position. And the white suit that he wore had not come from an ordinary tailor.
It
was made of heavy white silk—Habatui silk that in the East sells for its weight in gold, literally.
Adrian Wylie found Vivian on deck. In a few swift words she told him of the invitation and of the intuitive warning she had felt.
Wylie nodded slowly. “That explains something that had been puzzling me,” he said. “For an hour last night the purser insisted on buying me drinks in the smoking room and casually asking questions about the two of us. And hardly five minutes after he left me I saw him talking earnestly to Benedetti at the door of the purser’s office. Evidently the man hunted you up for the first thing this morning, after his talk with the purser.”
Benedetti, they knew from the ship’s gossip, was an exceedingly wealthy sugar planter, who owned the whole of an exceedingly fertile island called Ile de Feral, not far from the port of Cap St. Feral. The Haitian Sugar Centrals—actually the sugar trust, so ship gossip ran—had attempted to drive him out of business, and failed miserably. Despite a price war, he had managed to undersell the trust and still make a profit. Then he had been offered a staggering sum for the island, and had refused. The offer was still open, so she had been told, and any time he cared to sell the sugar trust would be only too eager to buy him out.
A little smile formed on Vivian’s lips. Benedetti, she suspected, was accustomed to having his own way where women were concerned. And the Lady from Hell knew full well her own attractiveness as a woman.
But even the Lady from Hell, astute as she was, could not have fathomed the dark reason that lay behind Benedetti’s advances.
Chapter II
Danger’s Warning
The faint sound of drums somewhere in the distance; a regular, rhythmic beat, as though a gigantic heart, the heart of Black Haiti were beating in the stillness of the blazing moon, hung over the little city of Cap St. Feral as the Lady from Hell, Wylie, and Benedetti rode through the sun-washed streets.